Are You Making These Common Adjective Mistakes?

While you can get away with these common adjective mistakes in a colloquial setting, they can cost you a lot in professional environment, especially in job interviews.

Common Adjective Mistake #1: I’m not interesting in the movie.

Correction: I’m not interested in the movie.

Explanation: Many adjectives are formed by adding prefixes such as “-ing” or “-ed” to a verb. When an adjective ends with “-ing”, it describes an effect of a thing or person. Likewise, when an adjective ends with “-ed”, it describes how a person feels.

In the example above, the movie is a thing which doesn’t not interest you. Therefore, the movie is not interesting to you. In other words, you’re not interested in the movie.

Common Adjective Mistake #2: The room smells awfully.

Correction: The room smells awful.

Explanation: Awful isn’t modifying the verb (smell) here, but the noun (the room).

However, you can write, “the room smells awfully funny.”

Here, “awfully funny” is an adjective phrase which goes after the linking verb smell.

Common Adjective Mistakes #3: He’s more stronger than his opponent.

Correction: He’s stronger than his opponent.

Explanation: This is a classic case of using Double Comparatives. When you use the comparative form of an adjective (stronger), there’s no need to use another adjective (more).